Moving Forward

While I make no promises whatsoever as to an earlier-than-planned release date for The White Thread, I find myself incapable of NOT moving forward at this point. The thing that's got the fire lit under me? It is (of all things) the desire to start my next fantasy series before another four years have passed. Christmas break is a great time for quiet contemplation (when the children are asleep, that is) and my contemplation has largely centered on new story ideas. I already have about ten series on the back burner from before I ever started The Gateway Chronicles, but I keep coming up with new ideas! (One of which I have particularly fallen in love with, to the point that I even pulled out a pen and paper and sketched my main characters - something I have not done since college). Anyhow, as much as I may love my new idea, I have absolutely no intentions of doing any real work on it until The Gateway Chronicles is complete. SO, I sat down and started going through my White Thread notes and began a very early-stage outline. I named and outlined the first 6 chapters tonight, but my brain won't cooperate! It keeps jumping ahead to much-anticipated scenes, some of which are not even in this installment. So once again I am convicted that I must make every moment of my books as arresting as those scenes that I am just dying to write and share with my audience. And as I get further on this endeavor, I also have more details to juggle in my mind. My notes are already copious, with the promise of more to come, and I think I need a new system of organizing them so that I don't leave anything crucial out of the story. And THIS is why I usually save this process for the summer... Well, we'll see what I get done over Christmas break and whether or not any of it makes the final cut come summertime.

"The Nature of Fantasy"

One of the literary inspirations that I named in my previous post was The Chronicles of Prydain by Lloyd Alexander, and I have been recently rereading my way through the series (it gets more delightful and thought-provoking every time I do). I always read the author's notes and introductions at the beginning of every book I read, and in Mr. Alexander's note on book 3 of the series, The Castle of Llyr, he says this: "The nature of fantasy allows happenings which reveal most clearly our own frailties and our own strengths." I had to stop and smile as I pondered the truth of this statement, because it so perfectly sums up why I love fantasy and why I write fantasy. Fantasy as a genre is a unique vessel for the transmittal of truth. A successful fantasy author will transmit truth in such a fashion that the reader will not even realize that they are being "taught" as they read; they will absorb the truth as a part of the story because that truth found in the story resonates with the moral compass within us all. In order for this resonance to take place, however, the reader must find something with which to relate within the story, and that usually happens through good characterization. Let's face it, nobody in real life is going to find himself or herself actually sucked out of this world and deposited into a new world with magic and magical creatures, right? BUT, somebody might be struggling with a particular issue (such as depression or loneliness) that causes them to relate to a character in a book that is going through the same issue. The beauty of fantasy is that it clearly contains heroes and villains, and the reader should relate to the hero in all of his or her struggles and seek to overcome those struggles as the hero does. The genre removes the reader from real life, however, helping this lesson not to feel overly didactic or too much like a self-help book. To bring this closer to home, I've made it no secret that Darcy in my books is very autobiographical. In a way the first book was a public confession of my early teenage flaws. Some of the most beautiful feedback that I've received on my books has come from parents who have told me that their teenage daughters really relate to Darcy. I think that this must be because Darcy reveals to them their own frailties in a (hopefully) non-offensive manner. My hope would next be, of course, that as Darcy grows and changes in the story, that she would also reveal to my younger readers their strengths as well, and how they might find strength in this life.

My discussion on this quote did not come out exactly as I wanted it to, but I hope that you all get the idea anyhow. My guess is that if you are a reader of fantasy, you will read that quote and, like me, nod and smile to yourself because you know how true it is. I would be interested to read some comments on this!

(I'm inserting a link to Amazon where you can purchase The Chronicles of Prydain if you're interested. They make a great gift for readers of all ages and have a male main character for those of you with sons who think that they would more enjoy reading about a boy than a girl. Just click on the title above.)

Literary Inspirations

I was asked by a coworker this week what literature has inspired me in my writing of The Gateway Chronicles, and I thought that perhaps the answer to that question might make for an interesting blog post, so here goes...

I have absolutely no hesitation in answering a question like this because I have always been very cognizant of the fact that a hugely important part of writing is the art of imitation. My awareness of this has only been sharpened in recent years as I have taught at a classical school in which there is a definite ideology of learning from the masters that have gone before us. Now, some people balk at this idea in regard to creative writing, and I have (at more than one time) had people recoil in horror and say, "You mean you copy other writers?! Isn't that plagiarism?" To which I have to answer, "Don't be absurd. Of course I don't mean that I copy other writers, but I do strive to emulate and imitate truth, beauty, and goodness as found in my favorite works. But I diverge... let me get back to the matter at hand by listing my strongest literary influences and saying in a nutshell what I have learned from each one (and therefore seek to also do in my own writing).

1. The Chronicles of Narnia by C. S. Lewis is definitely my oldest inspiration. It was Lewis (via Narnia) that first taught me how to suspend disbelief, and that depth of meaning does not need to be couched in lofty language.
2. The Hobbit and The Lord of the Rings by J. R. R. Tolkien. I read The Hobbit many years before The Lord of the Rings and I love them both in different ways. I think it was the former that taught me that fantasy writing should be clever (the chapter "Riddles in the Dark" impressed me and I often have returned to the book simply to read that chapter over again), and the latter that defined High Fantasy for me and taught me that fantasy literature should also be epic.
3. The Archives of Anthropos by John White were books that I dearly loved. It was through them that I saw how a different spin can be put on another person's idea to create something entirely new, and that it was not plagiarism to do so. (They are very reminiscent of Narnia.)
4. From Jane Austen's Pride and Prejudice I learned that the real meat of a story is in compelling, dynamic characters. I was given this book at age 13 and have read it at least once a year ever since.
5. J. K. Rowling's Harry Potter helped me to see that fantasy need not be allegorical in order to contain Christian themes, symbols, and messages, and that sometimes the most commercial-looking literature can be the most profound. I also learned from Harry Potter the joy of growing up with characters and that a series of books must be planned from beginning to end before the ink ever hits the page if it is to be a success. (I could also go into the literary alchemy that I learned from reading these books, but I would have to then also give credit to author and "Hogwarts Professor" John Granger).
6. And last, but not least, The Chronicles of Prydain by Lloyd Alexander. Although children's fantasy, I only stumbled upon these books as an adult... and fell immediately in love with them. From them I learned that epic fantasy (ala Lord of the Rings) could also come in a small package. They also reaffirmed everything that I had already learned from all my previous inspirations about the hero of a story: He/she must start out flawed and learn a little something along each step of the way. And although the hero need not be perfect by the end of a tale, the greatest lesson that he/she can learn is how to be selfless and self-sacrificing. Surround this hero with caring, bold, empathetic, loving, and humorous friends, and it should be a formula that works every time.

Well, I realize that I have been long-winded, but I am rather scatterbrained from lack of sleep (self-imposed... but I could not miss the midnight premier of Harry Potter 7 last night!). I hope this has been interesting. I have half a mind to revisit some of these topics in later blogs throughout the course of the year. But for now, to bed!

Amazon

The Oracle is now available on Amazon! It takes a while for all of the information to be uploaded to Amazon, but if you click on the link to the right, you can get directly to the page where you can purchase it. Don't forget that if you buy more than one, you can get free super saver shipping!

Available for Purchase!

I am happy to announce that book 2 of The Gateway Chronicles: The Oracle is now available for purchase! Just follow the link: https://www.createspace.com/3439454. The way that createspace works is that it is immediately for sale at the e-store (above) and it will show up on Amazon over the course of the next several days. I will be babysitting Amazon to check up on when it becomes available and will be sure to set up a hyperlink as soon as possible. A few notes on when and how to purchase: If you know that you only want to purchase one copy at the time being, it helps me the most to purchase it on the e-store mentioned above. If, however, you know that you want to immediately order two or more copies, it would be better for YOU to wait for it to show up on Amazon. Amazon offers free super saver shipping on purchases over $25.00, so larger orders save you money on shipping on Amazon (although I make about half the amount on the actual book compared to what I make on the e-store). It will also come available at large bookstores like Barnes and Noble or Books A Million for order, but I make very little money if they are purchased through the large chains. (Really, though, I'm happy for it to be purchased through any and every channel! I just want people to read my books!). If you live in town, you can also purchase it by paying me directly to order one in for you. I pay shipping in that situation and make the most money on the actual book. Well, I think that's all! I have to say that I feel an immense amount of relief at having finished the second book! Now I will rest for a few months, and then on to book 3: The White Thread.

Final Review

The Oracle is finished and submitted for its final review. This review process is typically very fast and I hope to be able to say that it will be approved in the morning, but we'll see. I'm a tiny bit concerned about some sizing on the cover, but if there is a problem with that, I should be able to get it ironed out within a day. Either way, I HOPE that it will be available for sale by the end of the weekend.

I just have to say that the completion of this project at the end here has been so totally exhausting. This week has been filled with many sleepless nights, and I've been struggling with migraines and an ulcer (heh, go figure) for the past two weeks. It's almost painful to be this close to the end and simply sitting and waiting for the review to go through, but waiting is part of the process as well. Next year when I am getting out book 3: The White Thread I'm going to try to manage my time more efficiently so that I don't feel this way around this same time a year from now. If somebody were to ask me if it is all worth it, however, I would of course say yes. I know that writing is in my blood, and it gives me a euphoric rush like nothing else on earth. To steal from Chariots of Fire, "When I [write], I feel God's pleasure!" I wish that I could come up with something more profound than that right now, but it is almost 3:30 in the morning and I have been working on finishing up the final revisions for 8 hours (following an 8 hour work day teaching, of course). I think that it is time to go to bed.

Meet the New Narks

Well, I had promised a few sneak peeks before The Oracle is officially published, and I realized that I had only posted one so far! So, I thought that I would introduce you all to two new narks that show up in book 2.

Wal Wyn ... was the fairest day nark she had ever seen. His eyes were so pale that they were almost clear, and his hair was not just blond, but white blond. Borna Fero, by comparison, was much darker as a day nark (his hair could almost be called light brown), and he was unusually thick and stocky. He wore his hair in a myriad of tiny braids, and the expression on his face looked a little crazed. He stood now swinging a large knife over and over between his hands, and when he'd introduced himself to Darcy that morning, he had told her that he had been raised by bears.
I had a lot of fun writing these two characters, and I hope that you enjoy reading about them in The Oracle. Speaking of which, I have the proof copy in my hand and I hope to be able to say that it is available for sale by the end of this week!